


Through the Shattered Glass

by TenyaTrash



Category: Mystic Messenger (Video Game)
Genre: Abusive Rika (Mystic Messenger), Creepy Unknown | Ray, Gen, Possessive Unknown | Ray (Mystic Messenger), Protective 707 | Choi Luciel, Protective Ray, Ray-centric, Reader Is Not Main Character (Mystic Messenger), Soft Unknown | Ray (Mystic Messenger), Unknown | Ray (Mystic Messenger) Angst, Unknown | Ray (Mystic Messenger) Lives
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-01-31
Updated: 2019-02-05
Packaged: 2019-10-19 23:17:41
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 4,553
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17610938
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TenyaTrash/pseuds/TenyaTrash
Summary: [Currently on Hiatus]Do you love people because of who they are, or for who you wish they could be?Is truth always a virtue, or do you deserve the comforting lie?-Rika has a prophetic dream of the MC taking everything from her, even V's devotion. She realizes she needs a new, better plan. Better help. More resources. She needs an inner circle that she can trust implicitly. She retreats into the shadows and puts a mind-bending plan in motion.-------Years later, 707 thinks he's found his prey. He infiltrates an unassuming compound and makes his way to the source of an incredible power drain. He opens the doors and finds everything he ever wanted, and more than he ever feared.As personalities clash and fight for dominance, who will emerge from the unknown depths?Will they like what they see in the mirror?





	1. Prologue: A New Dawn

The saviour wakes with a gasp, clutching silken sheets that cling greedily to her damp skin. She looks around, wide-eyed and panting. 

A blackened room drifts in and out of focus, and her breathing steadies. The humid night air skitters across her skin and she lays back, hunted eyes blinking up at the satin hangings that sway ever so slightly above her bed. 

The sticky air and oppressive darkness calm her, the dead of the night swaddling her from the lightness and horror of the dream. 

She winces. 

Her whole operation, her whole plan….even V, V who said he’d love her forever, all stolen away by some faceless pretender. She blinks away angry tears and reminds herself it’s just a dream….just anxiety manifesting now that she’s finally ready to take back the RFA. Still….the dream gives her pause. 

What if it’s a prophecy?  
She’d hardly be the first saviour to see the future.  
She bites her lip, hard enough to taste copper.  
In the dim room, she knows the trickle of blood will look inky black, and a shudder of pleasure runs through her. She wants to let her darkness ooze out. Wants to cover the world with it.  
She giggles.

Rika has always been a planner. The RFA might look to that liar for leadership now, but it was her efficiency and planning that built the organization into what it is today. There’s no rush, not really. After all, V is still drowning in guilt, and all the others are still languishing...stuck in old holding patterns, unable to forget her. 

She smiles sadly. She will rescue them all, but not yet. Prophecy or no, the dream has left her with a gnawing certainty that she has not planned enough. That she has been rushing. 

You can’t rush perfection. 

She thinks back to the dream, clutching at the disparate pieces as her brain starts to forget the finer details of her destruction. There’s one thread though, shining like obsidian. One follower who never forsook her, who never wavered. 

One ray of darkness amongst all the light.

She smiles, more earnestly this time.  
He’s such a good boy. So dedicated. So useful. So true.  
If only she had more followers like him, more individuals who truly understood her vision, who knew of the weaknesses and evil of false friends and broken promises. 

As her eyes close, new blueprints fill her mind.  
New uses for those ever-so-dedicated novitiates from the genetics firm.  
New rays of hope.


	2. Spring Cleaning

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Our players take their places.

A crinkled crisp bag sails through the air and makes contact with a nest of messy red hair.   
Golden eyes blink up at the attack, which, it turns out, is the opening shot of a larger barrage. 

“Clean. Up. Your. Mess.”

Each word is punctuated by a thrown snack food.   
They hurt more than they should.   
He’s pretty sure she’s added rocks to them. 

The young man parries away the last two honey-scented missiles before licking his fingers and wiggling his eyebrows at the exasperated woman standing at the much-abused kitchenette. 

Vanderwood is in a fighting stance.  
He squints.   
No.  
Worse.  
A nagging stance. 

He gives her the universal sign for “I’m sorry, now please calm down.”  
It’s not very effective.   
Probably because he’s smirking. 

Hands on hips, lip curled up in distaste, her nose is crinkled at the sight of abandoned containers and forgotten dishes. She opens her mouth to unleash what will no doubt be a torrent of recriminations, and he’s forced to take drastic measures. 

He grabs his hard drive and runs.  
In the process, he upends two open drinks and a bowl of increasingly stale salmon roe popcorn.   
Someone should really clean that up. 

Her shouts chase him out of the building.  
At one point, he swears he hears her rack a shotgun.   
He quirks his head to the side and analyzes the sound.  
Not a shotgun.  
An elephant gun.

Yeesh. 

So unprofessional. 

As he slides into the supple leather of his car, he shouts this observation over his shoulder and is rewarded by a truly colorful volley of expletives and the racking of a second shot. 

Before she has a chance to kill him, or worse, injure his baby, 707 is peeling out of the parking garage and retreating to a workstation where no one can disrupt his carefully crafted garbage sculptures. 

Some people just have no boundaries. 

\---

After a few blocks, the mirth fades from his eyes and barely contained tension returns to the surface. He thinks back the labyrinths of code, the strange energy signatures, the lurking silence that suggests that someone is stalking him from the shadows.

When he first lost his brother, he felt an emptiness that almost overtook him.   
Even though he knew it was the best solution.  
Even though he knew that Saeran would be happy and healthy, living a full life because of his sacrifice.   
Even with all that, there was a crushing loneliness where his twin used to be, like a phantom limb, aching in the night. 

But now...now he was slowly coming to miss that isolation. 

For the last year, he had felt something skittering in the shadows, a ghost that had yet to interact, but which was nonetheless following him across cyberspace.  
Gathering, observing, waiting.   
If only he knew why. 

The more he tried to pin down the start of the haunting, the farther back it seemed to stretch.   
The entity might have been following him for years.  
He was coming to accept that he wasn’t as alone, wasn’t as invisible as he thought. 

And that was very bad news. 

Automatic responses get him home along a winding but difficult to trace route.  
As the garage door closes and the car lowers, he throws off his glasses and scrubs his face with his hands. Vanderwood might not understand his process, but he knows he’s close. 

He pops the tab of a soda and grabs a bag of crisps before collapsing into the customized gaming chair and bringing his computer to life with a few delicate strokes and a surreptitious series of movements to disable the security. 

As the machine whirrs to life, Luciel, Angel of Light and God of the Internet, searches for his demon. 

Miles away, an unknown user logs in, a sickly face illuminated by a bank of pilfered monitors and an inner rage fierce enough to power a crusade.


	3. Investigations

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Our game is underway.

A mechanical voice trills out:

“Your report has finished compiling. Analysis complete.” 

707 cracks his knuckles and leans back, a self-satisfied smile blooming across his face. 

“Ha. Got you.”

He checks the data against his records (some of which were obtained through…creative...means) and squints at the satellite imagery, which reveals a secluded mountain compound with a simply fascinating energy footprint. This is a puzzle that he can’t wait to untangle, and someone has left a loose thread waving in the breeze, as if begging him to pull. 

He’s never been the best at delayed gratification. 

He flips out his cell and abuses his speed dial. 

“It’s Seven. Let Ms. Vanderwood know that, due to recent emotional distress, I’ll have to work from home for the time being. Yes, yes I agree it was childish and disruptive, but don’t discipline her too harshly. She can’t help the passion she feels for me.”

He clicks off before the flummoxed handler has the chance to clarify her remarks or deny his request.

“V- checking on something related to the breach. Yeah, forwarding the info to you just in case. The agency will check it out. Of course not. I’m a hacking god, I can explore the whole facility from the comfort of my computer. Yes, that’s really how it works. No, I’m not. V, calm yourself. I do this for a living. Yes, I promise. I’ll check in. Yes. Yes, Mom.”

He clicks off before V offers to come along or enlists Jumin’s security firm. 

“Hi, Sari? It is I, the enigmatic bachelor of your dreams. Don’t panic, but I won’t need my order tonight. Never fret, for I shall not be gone long. I remain, faithfully yours.”

He clicks off before Sari can remind him for the 100th time that this is a Domino’s pizza chain and a few cheese pizzas a week do not constitute a relationship. 

He smiles and posts a quick message to the RFA chatroom, mostly to remind them of his undying love for Elly and rile up Jumin. 

Those vital messages complete, he grabs a go bag and prepares to investigate, hoping V won’t be too put out when he learns that Seven is, in fact, going to the address and is not, in fact, taking backup. 

He blows a strand of hair out of his face and shakes his head ruefully. 

V worries too much.   
And he works better alone. 

\----

The unknown man flicks his eyes from screen to screen, half his attention on his own work, half monitoring the information requests coming from the not-so-secret agent’s not-so-secure device. 

He can’t help but sneer as he sees his quarry take the bait.   
Honestly, it’s pathetic.

“Oh yes. Show us how clever you are.”

No doubt Luciel will run off and tell V all he knows, taking credit for some grand discovery when in reality, he’s following breadcrumbs that a child could piece together. The RFA will continue to believe they’re in control until the moment it’s too late, all the while congratulating themselves about how superior they are. As if they’re better than him. As if they deserve the mercy his savior will provide. 

He snorts inelegantly as the rage takes over and he begins to swim in memories of betrayals both real and imagined. The savior is never wrong, so the other members must be redeemable. They’re just weak. Weak and sick and small. Like the other one is, always crying in the dark. Always waiting to be saved. 

Disgusting. 

But those two...both promising the world. Both pretending to care. Both betrayers and liars and thieves. They’re a perfect pair. And they deserve nothing. Nothing but pain. 

He indulges in a momentary lapse in attention while imagining all the ways in which he will make them hurt. He has such beautiful plans. He will be their reckoning, the savior has promised that. She made him strong, stronger than he could ever be on his own. And he will use that power in such provocative ways. He just needs his opening. 

A patched traffic cam catches an obnoxious red car speed through a yellow light and Unknown finds his focus again. He glares at the screen, as if through sheer force of will he can cause his red-headed nemesis to veer off a cliff and into fiery obscurity. The reckless way he drives, hacks, even speaks…everything he does is in service to the delusional belief that he matters, and it drives him half-mad. It's offensive. As if he deserves attention and praise and happiness. As if he’s immune from consequences. 

Just like father. 

The narcissism of the man’s actions is matched by the name he’s taken.  
Luciel.   
The angel of light.  
As if a name changes anything.  
As if he can erase his sins with a change of address and the cheap costume of a new personality. 

Just like father. 

The hacker grips his desk with white-knuckled rage.   
He’ll expose him.  
He’ll expose them all. 

\----

Soon enough, a flashy car idles and parks, hidden along a forested bluff some 200 meters away from the stuccoed walls of the target building. Seven looks down on the compound and pulls out one of his most rugged laptops, specially designed for the field work he so rarely engages in. As his fingers fly over the keys, he takes control of building security, for now just observing. He may seem off-the-cuff, but when it really matters, he knows how to wait.

Well, sometimes.


	4. Open Up

In his head, theme music is playing, adding a fluidity to his movements and a purpose to his step that isn’t necessarily based much in reality. An impartial observer would probably call his weaves and dives spastic, but what they lack in style, they make up for in effectiveness. He might look silly, but no cameras are tracking him and there’s no one to see. And when you’re breaching an installment, that’s what matters. 

Plus, 707 is used to being underestimated. 

After all, it’s a condition he’s carefully cultivated over the years. Being the joker gives him a freedom and a distance that’s hard to find and vital to his survival. He needs to keep everything surface. Sometimes, he’s even able to convince V. But playing the fool is just a disguise, and when the moment calls for it, he can be serious. He can be a plague. 

He reminds himself of this as he slips into a partially shielded doorway and whips out a inconspicuous looking phone, which has actually been cannibalized and retrofitted to serve as a hacker’s keyring. 

He boots up the code he modified earlier, gambling that his initial read on the security logs was correct and he’ll be able to hijack the keypad without too much fuss. 

His gamble pays off. 

As the device whirs to life, Seven can’t help throwing in a bit of humor.

“That’s right. In the name of Hacking God Seven, open this sesame.”

The door complies with a groan and Seven gets to indulge in a tiny power fantasy, like a child who presses their hands against the elevator doors and imagines they’re prying them open in some Herculean feat. He raises his hands like some half-mad villain, pretending to be telekinetically forcing the security shutter up with just the force of his thoughts. It's the little things that make life worth living. 

He chuckles silently before slipping inside. Child’s play.

Not that he was expecting much. The hacker who’d been stalking him and the RFA was certainly persistent and annoying, but the fact that Seven was aware of him at all meant he couldn’t be much of a threat. Real monsters stayed hidden. Real monsters had the people and resources to drain you from afar without ever exposing themselves. 

He shakes his head free of unpleasant memories and unanswered vendettas.  
It’s not the time. 

As the door clicks back into place behind him, Seven surveys the dim hallway that he’d previously only seen in hijacked camera feeds and questionable blueprints. No suprises. No danger. No unexpected twists, turns, or traps. A real organization would have duped the feed or fabricated the blueprints, but so far, everything was just as advertised. 

He blows a bit of hair out of his eyes in a huff of frustration.  
How boring. 

It’s not like he wants the RFA to be in danger….but if he drove all the way out here just to scare some fourteen-year-old LOLOL griefer, he’s going to be downright depressed. He was at least hoping for a mysterious cat cult, or a drug lab, or something. 

Seven follows the painfully accurate blueprints through a corridor, down a stairway, and into a sub-basement, all without ever seeing seeing another soul. Soon enough, he’s in front of the room with the strange energy signature, a pair of reinforced doors offering one last chance at something, anything, interesting happening in this bland space. 

He sends up a not-so-silent prayer, the boredom of this entire non-adventure sapping away his caution. 

“For the love of Elly, let there be a meth lab or evil AI or something behind these doors.”

The doors open and he gets his wish.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For the theme music, think Honey Buddha jingle more than James Bond.


	5. Everything You Never Wanted

If this was a movie, the hacking device would have fallen from Seven’s hands and rolled forward into the room, with the camera smoothly following its path, ready for the big reveal. A film crew would slowly pan up to show all the medical equipment, which would be bathed in green, blue, or yellow light (depending on the overall color story of the film). Seven would have some clever quip ready and spring into action before the audience really knew what was happening, and in no time at all, the set would be destroyed. 

Depending on the production budget, there might be explosions.

But this wasn’t a movie, and none of that happened. 

Instead, Seven stood in the doorway, body frozen as his brain failed, over and over, to compute what he was seeing. As his mind glitched, his body followed, hands tightening and tightening until his nails cut into his palm. Until the phone clutched in his hand began to creak under the pressure. Until the screw that he hadn’t fastened quite tight enough during the retrofit sheared off and the screen cracked. 

No quips came to mind.  
Nothing really did. 

Maybe, somewhere deep down there was pain, pain from the sight, pain from his hands, pain from what this might all mean. 

But in the moment, there was just static as he tried over and over to understand what he was seeing. 

What could not be. 

Time passes.

Nothing changes. 

The image doesn’t disappear. The sounds don’t stop. The source of the energy drain is clear. 

He takes off his glasses and polishes them desperately, as if that will solve anything.  
He’s afraid to put them back on, afraid in a way he hasn’t been since he left home, since he abandoned him. 

Him.

The image doesn’t waver. 

In front of Luciel, spread out like some horrible offering, like a djinn’s twisting of a granted wish, lays his brother. The hair has changed, the body is a little thinner than he’d like, but he knows. 

It’s him.  
His brother.  
His twin.  
His brother who is supposed to be safe and happy and whole.  
His brother who is not alone.  
Who is no longer just a twin.

Radiating across the room in a V formation are 9 tanks, five of which are occupied by some sick nightmare, by copies or clones or facsimiles of the young man that he sacrificed everything to save. They float there, unaware, bodies suspended in tubes that make him think of super-villains and old sci-fi movies. They’re mostly nude, which gives him a voyeuristic chance to catalog the differences. To try to make sense of this. Tattoos, scars, hair color….the window dressing changes, but the core is still the same. Still Saeran. 

He still hasn’t managed to move.  
This aberration of a reunion has short-circuited his brain.  
Human cloning doesn’t exist.  
Not like this.

He’s heard whispers, seen evidence, of small scale human cloning at black sites and dark labs, but never like this. This shouldn’t be possible. At most, they should have been able to create infants with the same make-up, but what he’s seeing before him is fully grown. 

Why?

Why would anyone..?

His first, traitorous thoughts are of the Agency.  
His second, of his father.  
But neither makes sense. 

The Agency could use him as a body double, he supposed, but why bother? He’s hardly a famous field agent. If they wanted to clone someone, Vanderwood was clearly superior.

His father. His father, he could see kidnapping Saeran. That part’s easy. And maybe dear old Dad would even keep him alive and clone him, in case he needed spare parts, but at that point, why bother with so many? And why not just clone himself for a perfect match? 

None of it makes sense. He growls in frustration at an inhuman universe. 

This isn't’ a plan. This isn’t some grand design. Whatever is happening here is madness, and must be stopped. 

The rage finally compels him to move, and he takes one horrible step forward.  
Then another.  
With a barely detectable tremor, Seven raises a tentative hand and touches the glass, beyond which his brother, or something wearing his face, floats, suspended in a blue fluid that seems to pulsate slightly in the light. A smear of blood follows his fingers, and he looks down in confusion.  
He’s bleeding.  
He’s not sure when that happened.  
It doesn't matter.  
Only Saeren matters. 

The crackling of a voice jolts him out of his spiral with the promise of answers. 

“Hello, Luciel. Welcome to Paradise.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Rika, Hotel California is not a how-to guide.
> 
> Also, have some art of this chapter:
> 
> http://tenyatrash.tumblr.com/image/182593886556


	6. Reunions

Seven spins around and looks for the disembodied voice. There’s no sign of an intruder, no footsteps to give them away. It crackles to life again and he realizes he’s being addressed through a wall-mounted speaker. 

“It’s so, so good to see you. You must excuse the mess, but I wanted to make this fun for you.”

He chokes at that. 

“Fun? How is this fun?”

A small part of him remembers how, only a few minutes earlier, he'd be upset at how boring the mission had become. Had craved adventure. It makes him feel small and ashamed. 

There is a long pause on the line, and he can’t tell if the speaker is toying with him or waiting for an apology for not appreciating the “gift.”

“Honestly, I thought you’d be happier. Everything will be perfect now. You can be a family again. With a mother who loves you, this time. Isn’t that what you've always wanted?”

He might be furious, but he’s also learning all he can. 

It’s a woman.  
It’s a woman that knows about his family.  
Maybe this is connected to their father after all. 

“You are not my mother. And I’m stopping this.”

Seven moves, as if to start pulling plugs, but the truth is, he’s not sure what his next move is. The voice seems to sense this.

“Oh? But why? I thought you loved your brother. I thought you’d do anything for him. Was that a lie? Are you a liar?”

There’s an edge to the voice now and, for the first time, Seven remembers that this person is not well. That no sane mind would do this, much less expect gratitude for it. 

He’s out of his depth.  
But so is she. 

He pulls out a phone and, sure enough, the building isn’t shielded. He can get a call out.  
He starts to dial the agency, ready to mobilize their considerable resources, when the voice interrupts icily.

“I’m disappointed in you. WHY?! Why did I even go to the trouble of saving him if you’re going to be ungrateful? If you want him dead so badly, do it yourself. Don’t wait for the GIS to do it for you. Be a man and betray him honestly, at least. Go on, do it. Kill him.”

Seven pauses.  
So she knows about his present, as well as his past.

“I’m not killing him. I’m saving him. They’ll...they’ll fix this.”

The last sentence sounds like he’s trying to convince himself, and she picks up on it. A high, hysterical laugh comes through the speakers, the distortion of the electronics adding to the demented quality of the ear-splitting sound. 

“Oh, my poor lost angel. You’re very stupid, aren’t you? I never realized how much you relied on your friends to think for you.” 

There’s a pause as the puppetmaster debates how to best make him dance. 

“Luciel, darling. He’s a clone. You must know that. What, exactly, do you think will happen when your little agency gets ahold of him?”

He shakes his head. 

“One of them….one of them is the real Saeran. We’ll save him and…”

“And kill the others?”

There’s no answer.  
The voice continues, close to a rant now. 

“You can’t keep living in a fairy tale. V’s convinced you that you deserve a happy ending, but you aren’t happy, are you? You’re alone. And I’ve worked so hard to fix that, to save you. And you’ll destroy it all just to avoid facing the truth. That, the agency uses you. V uses you. You’re a tool for them. But I could be your family. Everyone else takes from you, but not me. I’m giving you back your brother. Isn’t that nice? Isn’t that thoughtful? Wasn’t I clever to manage it?”

She takes a breath and her voice turns darker, less desperate. More dangerous. 

“If you call anyone, I guarantee they’ll kill them all. Or maybe, if you’re really unlucky, they’ll get sold off to some secret medical facility where they’ll be used for all sorts of fascinating experiments that can’t be ethically performed on real humans. After all, clones are illegal. They don’t have rights. As far as the world is concerned, they don't exist. And I’m certainly not going to tell you who the original subject is. You don’t get to wash your hands of us so easily.”

Seven grinds his forehead back into the glass of the tank and forces his eyes closed. 

“Can you live with that? With never knowing if you made the right choice? With leaving all these people, who, natural or not, are pieces of your brother, to their fate? They’re real, Luciel. They hurt, they laugh, they need. They’re not some abstract philosophical experiment. They’re living, breathing people. And they’re all your brother. Each of them, a version of the boy you abandoned.”

A tear leaks out against the glass.  
He doesn’t know how to fix this.  
He gives in. 

“What do you want?”

There’s a long pause, and he can almost hear the smile in her voice. 

“Stay. Stay here with me. You’ll get the chance to meet your brother, to learn the truth. And if you decide you know who the “real” Saeran is, I won’t stop you from taking him away. But I know you won’t. I know that you’ll see that we’re your real family. That we love you. That together, we can make a better world.”

The speaker cuts off, and Seven is left alone with his thoughts and his silent, floating brothers. 

It’s an impossible position. 

This person is clearly deranged. This whole situation is insane.  
But…he does want answers.  
He has no idea who the real Saeran is, not without talking to each of the copies.  
He shudders as he looks out over the tanks, evaluating the scene as if it’s some pre-boss fight puzzle. He needs to detach, to think about this logically, to find a loophole for this nightmare.

He needs time. 

And that’s what his captor is offering.  
Time to find the truth. 

Once he has it, he’ll take his real brother and escape.  
It’s not a good plan, he knows that, but’s the only way to keep Saeran safe. 

He holds both hands to the glass in a desperate attempt to connect, to be able to sense his twin amongst the imposters. He reaches out, searching the darkness for the twin sense that everyone claims to have, for a string to pull to unravel the truth. He doesn't find it. He’s so lost in the moment, he doesn’t hear the soft footsteps, or smell the delicate scent of jasmine that wafts into the room. 

He jumps when the voice speaks, no longer distorted and distant but impossibly close, dripping into his ear, soft and sweet, like poisoned wine.  
At the same time soft arms come from behind to wrap around him in a possessive hug. 

He spins on his heels and is pressed into the glass by the last person he ever expected.

Rika smiles disarmingly, like this is some happy reunion instead of a total mindfuck. 

“Like I said before: Welcome to paradise, Luciel.”

**Author's Note:**

> I started a thing.


End file.
